Friday, March 25, 2011

Leda and the Swan

This is "Leda and the Swan" by Cy Twombly, created in 1962. Twombly produced a highly abstracted telling of an ancient myth using only lines. In the myth, Zeus morphed into a swan and, depending on the telling, raped or seduced Leda. There are a few legible symbols, such as the window and the hearts. The rest of the lines have a frantic, violent quality that conveys the mood of the story's events. The more you look at the piece, the more the mind tries to deduce different pieces of the story. The lines can be read in different ways by different people. Even without knowing the background information, a viewer could still get a feel for what the artist was trying to portray. The characteristics of the lines speak for themselves.